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'^^"^ AS THE WIND BLOWS 

BY EDEN PHILLPOTTS 




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AS THE WIND BLOWS 



AS THE WIND BLOWS 



BY 

EDEN PHILLPOTTS 

AUTHOR OF "the GIRL AND THE FAUN," " DANCE OF THE MONTHS, 

"evander," etc. 



NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN CO. 

LONDON: ELKIN MATHEWS 



MCMXX 






>> 



THE RIVERSIDE PRESS LIMITED, EDINBURGH 



CONTENTS 



ON EYLESBARROW 








7 


NOCTURNE . 








8 


THE HUNTING 








9 


THE STRIKING HOURS 








10 


NIGHT 








II 


SWINBURNE . 








12 


JUNE 








13 


BELLS OF VARENNA . 








14 


IN THE VALLEY 








i6 


gaffer's SONG 








i8 


SCANDAL 








19 


WELCOME 








20 


THE NEOLITH 








21 


IN A WOOD . 








24 


GHOSTIES AT THE WEDDING 








26 


DAWN WIND 








27 


DART 








28 


BY RUNDLESTONE . 








30 


A SONG TO SILVER EYES 








31 


ENOUGH 








32 


SONG OF THE LARCHES 








32 


A SONG 








33 


BUONARROTI'S " DAWN " 








34 


5 











CONTENTS 



A DARTMOOR STREAM 








35 


THE FALL . 








37 


LAPWINGS . 








33 


TO AN OPAL 








39 


JACK O' LANTERN . 








40 


THE OLD ROAD 








41 


THE DOUBTFUL ONES 








42 


LITANY TO PAN 








44 


A SONG 








45 


CHERRYBROOK 








46 


THE hunter's moon 








47 


VOICES 








48 


WIND OF THE WEST 








50 


THE LOVER AND THE WIND 








51 


A SONG 








52 


THE GRAVE OF KEATS 








53 


TIGER 








55 


THE PUDDLE 








61 


VISION 








62 


IN GALLIPOLI 








63 


THEN AND NOW 








65 


VIGIL 








66 


DARTMOOR NIGHT . 








68 


THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 








70 


WHERE MY TREASURE IS 








80 



ON EYLESBARROW 

Hither, at set of autumn sun, 
Each golden child of Hesper flies 
From gardens of old deities, 
Where Zeus the maiden Hera won. 

Their footsteps kindled stone by stone 
The time-worn barrow, where it stands, 
Above wide, valley border-lands. 
Austere and imminent and alone. 

Their fingers smoothed each granite frown 
And blossomed where no flow'r may live. 
And gave, what never flow'r can give. 
Of living flame-light for a crown. 

And from their flickering kirtles fell 
A gleam upon its stubborn ways. 
To touch their nakedness with rays 
Of amaranth and asphodel. 

O Hesperids, remember him 

Whose sun is westering to the change. 

Along uneven paths and strange. 

By shadowed aisles and frontiers dim. 

Flash but one token, pure and rare, 
From the abundance of your grace. 
For many a storm hath stripped the face 
Of this, his life, and left it bare. 



ON EYLESBARROW 

Dance but one measure in a heart 
Sad and unprofitably proud, 
Ere to your chariots of cloud 
Ye leap again and so depart. 



NOCTURNE 

Twilight and falling dew ; a little bell 
And answering bell, from campanile far, 
Chime and are silent ; one triumphant star 
Conquers the after-glow, that like a shell, 
Nacreous and rose, vibrating as it dies, 
Faints on the lifted forehead of the snow, 
Falls from the deepening purple of the skies 
And falling fades upon the hill below. 
Unnumbered olive-trees, like hooded wights, 
Stand solemn in their companies and grey ; 
Mule-mounted men go clattering down the way 
To yonder galaxy of earth-born lights. 
The crepuscule from sea and radiant land 
Hath drunk the colour ; night lifts up her hand 
For peace before the coming of the moon — 
All darkling heaven will be silver soon. 



THE HUNTING 

When red sun fox steals down the sky, 

And darkness dims the heavens high, 

There leap again upon his tracks 

The eager, starry, hunting packs. 

They glitter, glitter, gold and green, 
With sparks of frosty fire between, 
And Dian bright as day ; 
While in the gloaming, far below. 
Brown owl doth shout " Hi ! Tally Ho 
Sun fox hath gone away ! " 



To music of the spheres they sweep 

Over the western world asleep ; 

Then in the east, with sudden rush. 

Sun fox shall whisk his white-tipped brush. 
The field is fading, gold and green. 
With sparks of frosty fire between, 
And Dian growing grey ; 
While morning leaps the hither hill 
And herald lark shouts with a will, 
" Sun fox hath gone away ! " 



Oh, Huntress fond and silly stars — 
White Venus, fiery, futile Mars, 
In vain your pack ye whirl and cast 
Upon the marches of the vast ; 
9 



10 THE HUNTING 

In vain ye glitter, gold and green, 
With sparks of frosty fire between, 
And Dian's arrows fly 
In shattered shafts of ebbing light ; 
For ne'er shall day be caught by night, 
And sun fox cannot die. 



THE STRIKING HOURS 

My brother, can the heart of ocean say 

When winds may woo her bosom ; when the ships, 
Or sudden galleon of an azure day, 

Shall fling her foam to rainbows ? Can eclipse 
Hide up their silver when the full moons will ? 

Are the cloud-cisterns of the latter rain 
At beck of every, summer-starven rill ? 

Life cannot call the time; nor man may feign 
That he shall haply choose when he would have : 

To will the striking hours he is not free. 
That chime between his cradle and his grave, 

Or speed, or slow the hands of destiny. 
A bunch of stars upon the vine of heaven 

Grows ripe and falls and passes when complete ; 
The galaxy of grapes to your mouth given. 

Bursting their bloomy chalices, are sweet 
One little moment ; for they will not stay 

Your pleasure and their consummation hold 
While you misdoubt and linger and delay 

Before their cups of purple and of gold. 
When to a feast the gods would make you free 
At their own time, or never, shall it be. 



NIGHT 

Another day has ended and again 

The fading emeralds of the quiet west 

Grow dusky o'er the hill-top and the plain, 

Dying along each drowsy vale and crest, 

Where Earth lifts up her bosom to the breast 

Of Night oncoming. Now once more she brings 

To the least folded flow'r her primal rest, 

Opens the mantle of her darkenings 

And sprinkles the white dew from both her starry wings. 

The moth and beetle, owl and flittermouse — 
All creatures that do call the moon their sun — 
Steal silent forth, each from his little house. 
They mount and fly, and others creep and run, 
Where fox and hare and brock have all begun 
The task of living. Now alert, awake. 
They seek their joy and substance ; every one 
Pads out into the dingle, heath and brake; 
While hungry fishes stir the silver of the lake. 

For servants of the day another boon 
Brings Night, and as the working hours decrease. 
Lifts up her evening star and sickle moon 
To disenthral, unfetter and release ; 
Bidding the long-drawn tale of labour cease. 
She comes with twilight healing for each smart 
Of soul and body, lays her unguent peace 
With fingers cool on every aching part ; 
Anoints the tired flesh, soothes the day-foundered heart. 
II 



12 NIGHT 

She asks no worship from our drooping eyes ; 
She needs no prayer to minister our plight ; 
Hers not our little deeds and destinies, 
But still to smooth the pillow, lower the light ; 
Play nurse for every world-aweary wight ; 
Comfort and succour ; at a touch redeem ; 
And pour her ancient anodyne of might : 
Omnipotent sleep, inviolate, supreme,' 
Insensible as death, without one sigh or dream. 



SWINBURNE 

Children and lovers and the cloud-robed sea 
Shall mourn him first ; and then the motherland, 
Weeping in silence by his empty hand 
And fallen sword, that flashed for Liberty. 
Song-bringer of a glad new minstrelsy. 
He came and found joy sleeping and swift fanned 
Old pagan fires, then snatched an altar brand 
And wrote, " The fearless only shall be free ! " 

Oh, by the flame that made thine heart a home. 

By the wild surges of thy silver song. 

Seer before the sunrise, may there come 

Spirits of dawn to light this aching wrong 

Called Earth ! Thou saw'st them in the foregrow roam ; 

But we still wait and watch, still thirst and long. 



JUNE 

June, who goes garlanded, who, never sleeping. 
Laughs from behind the eastern hills at night, 
And flashes to the hidden skylark keeping 
His morning watch and thrilling from the height 
Ere yet the stars are dim. 

June, who unseals all fountains at their sources, 
And pours life like a river overflowing 
In proud and passionate desire, who courses 
To throne our feeling higher than our knowing 
And heap it to the brim. 

June, when the new-born find their feet and wings, 
Scent the sweet grass and air and taste their being. 
And in their wanderings and wonderings, 
Their motion and their hearing and their seeing 
Conquer the earth and sky. 

June, with her feast of flow'rs and lyric rapture, 
Whose fair days fly the fleetest of the year. 
So pure and fresh that only youth may capture 
Their rainbow shapes without a thought of fear. 
Without a single sigh. 



13 



BELLS OF VARENNA 

Drowsy and sweet along the Larian Lake 

Your melody is stealing ; 

Your fitful pealing 

Floats on the pinion of a summer night. 

Aloft the murmuring upland echoes wake 

And wing upon the mountains, 

Whence flying fountains 

Thin their wild whiteness out o'er many a height, 

Bells of Varenna, 

Bells of Varenna — 

Ancient bells, 

Solemn bells, 
Bells, 
Bells. 

A tall grey campanile and a spire 

Of russet red upspringing, 

Meet for your ringing, 

O most melodious, mediaeval chime, 

Arise and point with fane of moonlight fire 

To forests and snow ridges 

And far-flung bridges 

And ruined castles of the olden time, 

Bells of Varenna, 

Bells of Varenna — 

Dulcet bells. 

Dreaming bells, 
Bells, 
Bells. 

14 



BELLS OF VARENNA 15 

Along a floor of crystal, where the moon, 

From her blue mansion bending. 

Awaits the sending 

Of your deep benison and soft " Good-night," 

Canorous cadence comes. Too soon, too soon, 

Faint off the last far throbbing 

And silver sobbing 

By Como's patined pathway, still and bright, 

Bells of Varenna, 

Bells of Varenna — 

Sleeping bells, 

Weary bells. 
Bells, 
Bells. 



IN THE VALLEY 

Heather and potentilla fold 

The rocks with purple and with gold ; 

The burn beneath sings clear and cold. 

Here man and woman kept a tryst ; 
Here often met ; here first they kissed 
Under the white and secret mist. 

And here, within this holy place. 
He came and thundered her disgrace. 
And looked his last upon her face. 

And while he cursed her ruined name, 
Her young soul fainted, sick with shame, 
Before the death knell of her fame. 

Had heath and potentil but known 
His wrath and her despairing moan. 
Their twinkling flowers had surely flown. 

And had the burn but felt that cry, 

Or understood their agony. 

She must have wept her silver dry. 

The grey hills heard the lover take 
An oath, that made their echoes ache, 
To hate all women for her sake. 

i6 



IN THE VALLEY 17 

The sunshine saw the woman cast 
Herself to earth when he had past, 
Her little pitcher broke at last. 

But heath and potentil are gay ; 
The waters sing upon their way, 
Though all this happened yesterday. 

For June must joy, though joy departs. 
And life must laugh, though sorrow smarts, 
And buds must break as well as hearts. 



GAFFER'S SONG 

The boys don't hoe like they used to do, 

And the maids don't sew like they used to do ; 

The hen don't lay 

And the hound don't bay, 

And the wind don't blow like it used to do. 

The men don't drink like they used to do, 

And the girls don't wink like they used to do ; 

The bud don't swell 

And the flow'rs don't smell ; 

And the folk don't think like they used to do. 

The milk don't cream like it used to do. 

And the ewes don't teem like they used to do ; 

The corn don't kern 

And the sun don't burn ; 

And my head won't scheme like it used to do. 

Bad men ban't hung like they used to be, 

Good songs ban't sung like they used to be ; 

The jolly and wise 

Have all flown to the skies ; 

And I ban't so young as I used to be. 



i8 



SCANDAL 

The owl alighted in a yew 
Beside the portals of my house; 
The hour was nearly half-past two 
And, as he ate his juicy mouse, 
A cuckoo clock made cheerful chime 
Within and shouted out the time. 

" O gracious God ! " the owl began, 
And rolled his round eyes at the moon, 
" What a black piece of work is man — 
Well might we miss cuckoo in June, 
How mad, misguided, inhumane 
To keep a cuckoo on a chain ! 

" But all the feathered folk must know ; 
This infamy I'll bring to light 
And tell the horror high and low 
And scream the crime by day and night. 
No bird shall sing to him again 
Who keeps a cuckoo on a chain." 

Good neighbour, of your charity 
Consider that mistaken fowl ; 
Beware you tell not truth awry 
And, hooting with your brother owl, 
Into the public ear complain 
I keep a cuckoo on a chain. 



19 



WELCOME 

The hard azure on high 
That bends over the Spring 
Falls a tinkling, a thrill — 
Sudden, silvery, shrill; 
For the lark's in the sky 
And his lyre-shapen wing 
Lifts the song in a spiral at will. 

In the East is the wind ; 

At the fringe of the wood 

Shiver catkins of gold 

Or the fleece and the fold. 

Sure the eaning ewes find 

That the sunlight is good, 

Though chill Eurus, his scythe's on the wold. 

Dawns a sweet lemon light 
Through the red-bosomed earth ; 
Leaps and sparkles a train 
Along dingle and lane ; 
For the primrosen bright, 
They are come to their birth 
And the daffodil's dancing again. 



20 



THE NEOLITH 

Sole standing in utter loneliness — superbly alone — 

A monolith ruggedly lifts, with the roseal ling at his feet. 

Only the murmur of bees and the twinkle and throb of the 

heat 
On the league-long height, and the shade from his granite 

thrown. 

Roll upon roll of the Moor flung out on a sky-line free; 
Clouds at the zenith blue ; in the flower-clad earth beneath 
The dust of a neolith : one who has swept this heath 
As the chieftain of vanished hordes and their fate and their 
destiny. 

When he died, that no mocking phantom, or jealous shade 
Of him mighty, should darken their lodge in the distant 

glen, 
They brought their lord hither, on shoulders of mourning 

men. 
And tore at their hair and howled long and fierce music 

made. 

Then they sought for a stone of girth that should evermore 

mark his place 
And be seen for remembrance, afar on the frowning hill, 
Of that leader of men, whose right arm and resistless will 
Had lifted his clan to power and to splendour and pride of 

face. 

He was cooped with his knees to his chin in a granite kist, 
And a granite flake over his head that should last till doom. 

21 



22 THE NEOLITH 

So near doth he seem that one feels him not dead in his 

tomb, 
But crouching, alive and alert, with a warrior's axe in his 

fist. 

Does he hear the old gods of the thunder ? Can summer 

sun 
Reach down to his pit ? May his dog's ears discern the 

rain 
Hissing over the heather, or tell if the purple stain 
From a cloud-shadow dims his grey stone? When the 

ponies run. 

Can he mark the dull drumming above of their unshod 

feet? 
Does he chill when the snowdrift is clogged on the frozen 

ground ? 
Does he thrill to the shout of the stream, or the bay of the 

hound, 
Or heed the sad curlew's cry and the brown snipe bleating 

his bleat ? 

Nay, for nothing lies under the grass but the broken stones 
Or mayhap a primeval crock, or a fleck of red rust, 
For the hero is earth of the earth, and its dust is his dust. 
And his flesh is the flesh of the peat, and its bones are his 
very bones. 

That master of men is ascended, for joy and for bane, 
And life after life hath he lived and relinquished since 

then — 
In the heather and herbage and birds, in the beetles and 

foxes and men. 
Each in their turn sprung of earth ; each in their turn earth 

again. 



THE NEOLITH 23 

Yesterday clad with great thews, that builded a chieftain of 

might ; 
To-day where the milkwort and fern and the starry 

tormentil 
Spread joy by the auburn beck and loveliness on the hill ; 
To-morrow a moorman's fire at the fall of a winter's night. 

And the aura, so azure clear, that is running above the red, 

Was the glow of a savage heart imprisoned within the 
brand ; 

And the warmth on your hand was the sun on a stone- 
man's hand 

In the far off urgent days that were lived by the ancient 
dead. 

So mutable myriads wake to the ring of their morning 

chime ; 
So mutable myriads pass at the set of their final sun ; 
And only Matter remains — the august, the unchanging 

one — 
But no shape and no shadow of aught that she moulds on 

the wheel of Time. 

And ye who would bring man his soul from a mystical 

matrix apart ; 
And ye who would lift up man's life to a land beyond 

Matter's ken, 
Must proclaim how her rape overtook her, and wherefore, 

and when. 
Ere we bend to your idols, or take these your fairyland 

stories to heart. 



IN A WOOD 

There runs a pathway through the wood 
Where lace the boughs and all is good. 
The beech-boles don a robe of white 
And gleam Hke ghosts at dayspring light, 
When first the pure, canorous note 
Throbs from a waking blackbird's throat ; 
And down the long aisle dim 
Another answers him. 



Often they met, the girl and boy 
At this still hour ; it was her joy 
To share a kiss at peep of day 
Before he took his working way. 
Then light of heart the youngster went, 
Leaving the little maid content 
To seek her home near by 
The forest boundary. 



But when at evening back he came 
Where the beech-boles were all aflame 
With ruddy fire along the glade. 
She leapt from out some stealthy shade. 
And dawdling once when sunset shone. 
He cut their letters, one in one. 
Upon an ancient stem, 
And drew a heart around them. 

24 



IN A WOOD 25 

Then rose the red, accursed star, 
And honour swept her boy afar ; 
While she, sore hindered and forlorn, 
Still heard the blackbird sing at morn, 
Still felt her heart with each sun sink, 
Knowing he stood upon the brink, 
Prayed on in hope and trust — 
Until the boy was dust. 

Life brought its anodyne of years. 

To dull young griefs and dry young tears, 

And Time, who knows not to stand still, 

Sent a new lover up the hill. 

A wife and mother now she goes 

And plays with her first baby's toes — 

The name in memory 

Spoken without a sigh. 

And grey upon the beech's rind. 
Foregone, forgotten, out of mind. 
Two woven letters may be told 
When dawns are white and eves are gold ; 
Where his aubade the blackbird makes. 
Or sleepy, sweet good-even takes ; 
And down the long aisle dim 
Another answers him. 



GHOSTIES AT THE WEDDING 

Turn down a glass afore his place ; 

Draw up the dog-eared chair ; 
For though we shall not see his face, 

I think he will be there 

Our wedding day to share. 

Turn up the glass where she would be 
And put a red rose there. 

Her quick, grey eyes we cannot see. 
But weren't they everywhere, 
And shall not they be here ? 

Though them old blids are in the grave 
And their good light's gone out. 

We'd sooner their kind ghosties have 
Than all the living rout 
As will be there no doubt. 

For some are dead as cannot die. 

Some flown as cannot flee. 
You still do fancy 'em near by. 

'Tis so with him and she. 

At any rate to we. 



26 



DAWN WIND 

Wind of the Dawn am I, and only She 
Who knows the music of my every song 
Can hear the whisper lingering along 
Melodiously. 

Melodiously along the moonlit corn, 
With silver fingering all my peaceful way, 
I nightly wander towards another day 
Soon to be born. 

Lo ! from the East he comes ; and I rejoice 
And throbbing on into the ruddy light 
Leap like a giant from the dying night 
With organ voice. 

Along the rosy, misty, magic lands 
That gleam above each dewy-scented lea 
The children of the morning welcome me 
And clap their hands. 



27 



DART 

Elfin river, stealing from far-off granite cradle, 
Musical the place names upon thy tidal water ; 
Tuckenhay and Greenway, Stoke Gabriel and Dittisham, 
Sharpham and Duncannon, beside thy margin's mirror — 
Sweet bells all a-chiming for native ear that knows them. 
Rainbows in November, above the hillside footed. 
Burn along the brake fern to set the auburn flaming 
In transparent wonders of emerald and purple ; 
Till descends the hailstorm, with lash and scourge ice- 
knotted, 
Hurtling through the coppice; from larch and cherry 

robbing 
Amber dust and crimson. Chattering then and hissing, 
And fretting first thy bosom into a sudden torment, 
He draws his tatters round him and huddles off to seaward. 
So the sun returning, by hover and by ripple, 
Charms thy fleeting turmoil and wins thee back to 

laughter. 
At the river ferry a little bell is calling ; 
And where the red earth arches, low on the blue above it, 
Man and horses ploughing, herald a cloud behind them 
Of the great, white sea-fowl that feed along the furrow. 
Cobweb grey thine orchards, still the last apples ling'ring, 
Topaz and ruby tangled upon the frosted lichen ; 
While broad, oaken hangers, a rapture for the sunset, 
Meet the steadfast beech scrub, like red-hot fire aglowing, 
Till their conflagrations, that blaze along the tide way, 
Melt in flame and mingle their wonder with thy crystal. 
Massy, rounded elm-trees roll out along the river, 

28 



DART 29 

And above, in billows far mightier and vaster, 
Sail the light-laden clouds, that lift another forest 
Bossed and round as they are and carry up their image. 
Crested, crowned and golden, into the hyaline azure. 
Pale that lifted glory and faint those sun-touched summits 
Seen against the ardour of thine own earth-born elm-trees. 
Down beside the reed-rond, pulse of the sea, a-weary, 
Doth bring a wreath of flow'rs to mark the place of parting. 
High above them glitters the wide weir's silver apron 
And the bright salmon leap, springing from salt to 

sweetness. 
Farewell, worthy worship in all thy times and seasons ; 
By thy magic subtle of many a deep and rapid ; 
By thy sunny reaches and mystery of shadow ; 
Thy gentle hillsides green and dear delight of forests ; 
By the surprise of coombs, the hanging woods and dingles ; 
The happy days and sad ; the murmur of thy voices ; 
Thy changing, winsome moods and little lovelinesses. 
Thou art all Devon, and so incomparably England. 



BY RUNDLESTONE 

Her cottage solitary stood 
Beside the granite Rundlestone — 
Lonely enough, but not so lone 
That fortune missed it, ill and good. 

And faring by that way once more 
I sought to see the friend of old, 
And found an orange-lily's gold 
Still burning by her cottage door. 

There seemed no stir about the place ; 
No voice responded to my call ; 
I heard no tardy footsteps fall, 
Nor welcomed her familiar face. 

From open window overhead 
There came a dull and fitful flap, 
Where the blind bulged and filled the gap 
And billowed as the breezes sped. 

Empty the house, for she had gone 
Full many a moon before that day. 
Passing in steadfast faith away 
To join her man beneath his stone. 

And now, when currents of the mind 
Drift to my thought her vanished name, 
I see the orange-lily flame 
And hear the flapping of a bUnd. 

30 



A SONG TO SILVER EYES 

Now that the dayspring surely comes 
To wake a dreaming world once more 
And light a thousand, thousand homes 
With message from the Eastern shore; 
Though dawn doth shiver sad and grey 
And sombre clouds hide earth and sea, 
My love shall be the sun to me 
And glad' my going through the day. 

When mournful darkness falls again 
To sink old earth in slumber deep, 
Save where the sisters, sorrow, pain, 
Their sobbing, throbbing vigils keep ; 
Though faint my heart and dim my sight 
Beneath the storm's immensity, 
My love shall be a star to me 
And guide my going through the night. 



31 



ENOUGH 

The larch, the birch and the eagle fern 
And granite grey ; 

The cry of the kine and the song of the burn 
Down Dartmoor way. 

A league-long tramp to a lifted stone 
Under the sky ; 

Long lustral hours superbly alone — 
My soul and I. 

For you be the kingdoms that you list, 
The seas you will ; 

And mine a white rainbow in the mist 
On a heather hill. 



SONG OF THE LARCHES 

Not foliage, but emerald fires 

Run through our legions in the spring, 

Until their myriad points and spires 

Are hidden past remembering. 

Through hanging wood, by dell and dene 

Again we ray ourselves in green. 

Not foliage, but aureate fires 
Leap through our legions in the fall. 
When autumn lights her saffron pyres 
And the red sun sinks to a ball. 
Like golden smoke across the grey 
We fling our worn-out robes away. 

32 



A SONG 

Shadows we are and shadows seek 
And haunt the place where shadows move ; 
But I, who know thy blessed love, 
Scorn shadowland and all things weak. 

Thou art alone reality ; 
The rest is dream within a dream. 
My life knows nothing but doth seem 
Save only thee, save only thee. 

Through noon of day and noon of night 
There steals a golden thought and rare. 
That still we breathe the self-same air, 
Still glory in the same delight. 

That soul to soul and sense to sense — 
Our heavens woven into one — 
We're shining, each the other's sun. 
Before we vanish and go hence. 

And if thy love should faint and die. 
The deep, eternal after-glow 
Shall burn for ever where I go — 
A cloud of hght in my grey sky. 



33 



BUONARROTI'S "DAWN" 

Spirit of twilight chill and upper air 
Stretched desolate upon the rack of morn ; 
Thou hooded grief from mountain marble torn, 
Gazing sad-lidded on the sky's despair, 
While the grey stars, like tears, descend forlorn ; 
Earth's broken heart and man's unsleeping care 
Wait on thy pillow, crying to be borne — 
The only burden thou shalt ever bear. 
No infant hope may dream on thy deep breast, 
No little lip may soothe with infant might 
Thy mouth's immortal woe ; for thee, oppressed. 
Dawn dim epiphanies beyond all light, 
Where man's long agony and cry for rest 
But torture dayspring into darker night. 



34 



A DARTMOOR STREAM 

When Shakespeare wrote, you sang the song I hear, 
And when Eliza reigned, your lint-white locks 
Flashed where they flash to-day, among the rocks, 

And showered their tresses twined into the brown pool 
clear. 



You danced and flung your foam upon the fern. 
And sang along your green and granite ways 
Even as now, in far-ofl" Golden days, 

When toiled the tinner men beside your heathery urn. 



Their ruins shrink beside you ; foxglove springs 
Above the roofless hut and smelting place; 
No more their shadows fall upon your face, 

Or mediaeval chime of pick and hammer rings. 



But they were children in your lap beside 
The early men of stone, whose lodges stand, 
Like mushroom circles grey upon the land 

Above the cotton-grass that marks your cradle wide. 



The bear has lapped your crystal on his rounds ; 
The stricken elk beside you dropped at last — 
A flint home in his shoulder, deep and fast — 

To smear your emerald moss from red of deathly wounds. 

35 



36 A DARTMOOR STREAM 

And now, where once the wolf pack hunting went, 
With ululation through the snowy nights, 
Leap motor cars upon the highway heights, 

And by their hooting horns the silent air is rent. 

All one to you : machine and beast and man. 

And Time, that leads them off and brings them in ; 
You strive above all circumstance, to win 

Your immemorial dream and predetermined plan. 

Unchanging, ever-changing, you possess 
Your spirit quickened with an ardour still 
Of workmanship — a patient, steadfast will 

To rarer beauty yet and purer loveliness. 



THE FALL 

I'll sing a song of kings and queens 
And falling leaves and flying rain, 
With Time to mow, and Fate who gleans 
Their good and evil, boon and bane. 

I'll sing a song of leaves and rains 
And flying queens and falling kings, 
Yet doubt not reason still remains 
Snug hidden at the core of things. 

For every year an autumn brings 
To round the root and fat the sheaves 
And haply garner queens and kings 
With falling rain and flying leaves. 

The rain is salt with tears of queens, 
The leaves are red with blood of kings ; 
Unknowing what the mystery means, 
We puzzle at these mighty things. 

For why great kings and rains should fall, 
And wherefore leaves and queens should fly, 
Or such rare wonders be at all. 
You cannot tell ; no more can I. 

Yet this we know : new leaves and rain 
Anon shall crown the vernal scene. 
But dust of dynasts not again 
Blows up into a king or queen. 

37 



LAPWINGS 

When white ice tinkles on the rutted roads 
And icicles are bearding from the thatch ; 
When fens are froze, the lapwings make despatch 
And all a-mewing come from their frost-bound abodes. 

With rush of wings upon the northern wind 

Across the wintry blue, like sparks of gold 

They flash into the valleys, hunger-bold, 

And seek their comforting with doubtful human-kind. 

They love the lew, where yellow corn-stacks stand. 

And puff their feathers in the paUid sun, 

Go daintily about and peep and run. 

Like pixy pilgrim folk of some far fairy-land. 

And near to bud-break, when young grey-eyed Spring, 

Clad in the silver of an April rain. 

Calls from the hill-tops, home they go again 

And lift their kitten cries to give her welcoming. 



38 



TO AN OPAL 

Wrapt in the radiant air's own milky tress, 

That's less than cloud and more than cloudlessness, 

Dawn-light and moon-light art thou ; dreaming fire, 

That dies along the west : a pulse : a pyre 

Burning beneath the brow of some red eave ; 

The very staple that the salt winds weave 

Into the vaporous east, or sobbing south, 

When some grey hurricane sucks at the mouth 

Of the dear, wild-haired sea, and with huge mirth 

Rains back his rape of kisses on the earth. 

The blooms of old-world flow'rs in ancient garths ; 

The dancing aureole of winter hearths ; 

The argent flame that haunts eternal snows : 

Spray of the burn and petal of the rose ; 

Gleam of the dragon-fly or halcyon's wing; 

The dew-bedappled kirtle of the Spring ; 

The amber ripple of the kerning corn ; 

Splendour of fruit ; where ripeness, like a morn, 

Breaks through the bloom ; the rainbow's liquid light 

The northern dancers of an arctic night ; 

Nacre of pearl and foam upon the sea — 

All these, thou glimmering epitome 

Of the world's glory, throb and nestle here 

Within the little compass of a tear. 



39 



JACK O' LANTERN 

Where the dim marrish oozes out and fills 

The lap of the hills, 

While drowsy gloom broods deep upon the wold, 

They keep their place and take their trembling flight 

And fringe the night 

With paUid flowers of azure and faint gold. 

Along the darkness elfin lanterns flicker, 

Now slow, now quicker — 

A pale corona set upon the mire. 

They float and fly and leap and sink together 

Upon one tether, 

Where ancient fens excern their lambent fire. 

Thin, shaking, blue—spectres of flame — they travel 

And break and ravel, 

Then fade and flash again and fade again. 

They wave their lamps upon the quag; they quiver 

And soar and shiver 

And flit, like little ghosts, above the plain. 

Born from the heavy breath of sleeping Earth, 

In feeble mirth 

They trail and slink and linger, rise and fall ; 

Then, shuddering before the chill of day, 

Soon speed away. 

Blow out their lights and vanish, one and all. 



40 



THE OLD ROAD 

How short the road with you, my friend, 

How short the road with you — 

The hills and vales, the heights and dales 

And each unfolding view ; 

For side by side and foot by foot, 

Though long that summer noon, 

The twilight fell too soon, my friend, 

The twilight fell too soon. 

How far the road alone, my friend, 

How far the road alone ; 

The hills how steep, the dales how deep, 

Their ancient magic flown ; 

For now the way, together trod, 

You cannot tread again. 

Is twenty miles of pain, my friend. 

Is twenty miles of pain. 

Still winds the patient road, my friend ; 

Still winds the patient road, 

Whereon I go, now high, now low, 

With my appointed load ; 

And glories shared I felt were gone 

For ever when you past. 

Have brought you back at last, my friend, 

Have brought you back at last. 



41 



THE DOUBTFUL ONES 

They lie about, the naughty folk, a-mingling with the rest, 
And just so green the grave-grass on their mounds as on 

the best ; 
For Nature's poor at morals, and to her they're all the 

same. 
With their virtues no great matter and their vices no great 

shame. 
Tom White bides there : they say he slew his first to wed 

another. 
And that's the hill that hides Jack Ford, as robbed his own 

grandmother. 
This lump of earth, where dandelions be keeping such a 

state, 
Is Katherine Jay's, the baby's friend, once known as "cruel 

Kate." 
They dug up thirteen childer in her garden, so 'tis said ; 
And when they ran the creature down, she'd cut her evil 

thread. 
Near by we teeled Bart. Coombstock — one as took his own 

life too : 
He hanged hisself at seventy-three, though why for no man 

knew. 
And Martin Cobley, in a pit beside they godly Foxes, 
Did six months of his middle time for breaking the alms 

boxes. 
Where yonder row of Caunters lie — a famed and far-spread 

clan — 
Have crept their black sheep, Rupert, him once called 

*'the gentleman." 

42 



THE DOUBTFUL ONES 43 

A reckless love-hunter was he, and made an end of life 
When Noah Bassett shot him dead for playing with his 

wife. 
Poor Nelly Dingle, buried by the lich-gate on the left, 
Burned six good stacks of wheat the night they flung her 

out for theft ; 
And they small hillocks, down-along, of babies side by 

side. 
Be "chrisomers," as never got baptised afore they died. 
There do they rest— the doubtful ones— and sleep so sweet 

and sound 
As any proper saint of God that ever went to ground ; 
But when the graves be opened and they birds begin to 

sing- 
Lord ! Won't it be a funny dish to set before the King ! 



/ 



LITANY TO PAN 



By the abortions of the teeming Spring, 
By Summer's starved and withered offering, 
By Autumn's stricken hope and Winter's sting, 
Oh, hear ! 

By the ichneumon on the writhing worm, 
By the swift, far-flung poison of the germ, 
By soft and foul brought out of hard and firm, 
Oh, hear ! 

By the fierce battle under every blade, 

By the etiolation of the shade. 

By drought and thirst and things undone half made, 

Oh, hear ! 

By all the horrors of re-quickened dust, 
By the eternal waste of baffled lust. 
By mildews and by cankers and by rust, 
Oh, hear ! 

By the fierce scythe of Spring upon the wold, 
By the dead eaning mother in the fold, 
By stillborn, stricken young and tortured old, 
Oh, hear ! 

By fading eyes pecked from a dying head. 
By the hot mouthful of a thing not dead. 
By all thy bleeding, struggling, shrieking red. 
Oh, hear ' 



LITANY TO PAN 45 

By all the agonies of all the past, 
By earth's cold dust and ashes at the last, 
By her return to the unconscious vast, 
Oh, hear ! 



A SONG 

How I have lived while others slept, 
With the white moon and thee ! 
Heaven-high my adoration leapt 
Sea-deep my ecstasy. 

And now one memory I keep 
Till life and I shall part : 
She loved me well enough to sleep 
In peace upon my heart. 



CHERRYBROOK 

Far more than others feel or see ; 

Far more than others hear or know, 
Awakes and lives and throbs for me 

When by the Cherrybrook I go. • 

For others, Bellevor's green side 
And yellow furzes burning bright ; 

Grouse heather, foaming like a tide, 

And stones that dance, or drow^se in light. 

For others, just a singing stream 
Of flashing stickles, cherry red, 

That mirrors in her breast the beam, 
Like golden beads upon a thread. 

For me, a river of regret 

In every reach so still and clear — 
A streamlet, where I follow yet 

The Shadow of a brother dear. 

I see his trout-rod catch the sun ; 

I hear the music of his reel ; 
Knowing his kindly days are done, 

His good hfe gone beyond appeal. 

Now other rods are twinkling high ; 

But the grey shape I used to bless. 
Lacking, the stream runs lonely by 

And Cherrybrook's an emptiness. 

46 



THE HUNTER'S MOON 

October day drifts into night and now, 
Globing red gold upon a naked bough, 
The Hunter's Moon climbs through a ragged larch, 
Swings out on Heaven and sweeps her steadfast arch 
Through cloudrack dim ; while underneath there lie 
The darkling forests and the floods, and fly 
Leaves from the summer woods. They tinkle down 
Russet and sere, etiolate and brown. 
Blood-red and scarlet, auburn, silver, grey — 
Good millions, bearing wherewithal to pay 
Debt of the trees. The busy earthworms cold 
Draw in the yearly dues to rich the mould. 
Storing what tree-tops earned ; and thus full round 
The cycle spins ; for sure the sodden ground 
Is but a bank, that hoards to give again, 
Wherein the beetle and the mole and rain 
Balance their books beneath the Hunter's Moon, 
While Nature budgets for another June. 



47 



VOICES 



Harken, harken, neighbour, harken ! 
There be little childer jangling, 
There be childer up-long wrangling 
By the thorn-tree in the wood. 
Nay, them noises you are hearing, 
Out of yonder blue-bell clearing, 
Are the wild cat's kitlings playing. 
While their mother's hunting food. 

II 

Harken, harken, neighbour, harken ! 
There's the pixy bells a-ringing, 
And the dinky pixies singing 
Through the curtain of the rain. 
Nay, 'tis but a flock of plover — 
Golden plover now come over. 
From the places of their summer, 
To their winter home again. 

Ill 
Harken, harken, neighbour, harken ! 
There's some poor, unhappy devil 
Homing drunk after a revel, 
Drowned in snow and lost in night. 
Nay, that creepy, crawly yowling 
Be red fox up over howling, 
Pads acold and belly empty, 
Hunger-starven for a bite. 

48 



VOICES 49 

IV 

Harken, harken, neighbour, harken ! 
To the sound of woman's waiHng — 
A sad woman, quailing, railing, 
Like the sob of wind-swept leaves. 
Nay, that ban't no cry of woman, 
Nor the moan of any human : 
'Tis the murmur of the hill-tops 
And " the calling of the cleaves." 



WIND OF THE WEST 

I BEAR the banner of the sun at noon ; 
I light the milUon jewelled lamps of June; 
I weave, from sky and purple sea below, 
The rosy cradle where a baby moon 
Rocks in the after-glow. 

Awake ye bells, shine out ye stars of Spring ; 
And let the music of the wild wood ring ; 
Deck my dear harp anew with golden green — 
My ancient forest harp, whereon I sing 
Of all this budding scene. 

A song of rainbows gleaming on the rain ; 
Of sap and scent and sunlight come again ; 
Of the young laughing year's unmeasured mirth ; 
Of quickened Nature's mother-pang, whose pain 
Forewent this vernal birth. 



50 



THE LOVER AND THE WIND 

" Wind of the South with the wild, wet mouth, 

Cease from thy wailing and fury of railing ; 

Whisper to me in my vigils of pain 

That soon I shall meet her, 

And soon I shall greet her, 

And thrill with the passion of kisses again. 

" Wind of the South with the wild, wet mouth, 

Silence thy raving and hark to my craving ; 

Echo a hope through my vigils of pain. 

I hunger to hold her, 

I throb to enfold her 

And melt in the fire of her body again." 

" Suffering man, since thy race began 

I have been weeping and I have been keeping 

A myriad vigils of sorrow and pain. 

No more shalt thou meet her, 

No more shalt thou greet her. 

Or thrill with the passion of kisses again. 

'' Suffering man, the arc of thy span 

To-morrow is bounded and finished and rounded. 

Thou shalt forget all thy vigils of pain, 

Nor hunger to hold her. 

Nor throb to enfold her. 

Nor cry for the fire of her body again." 



A SONG 

The red's in the heather, the gold's on the fern- 
Heigho ! Heigho ! 

A nip to the wind and the year at the turn — 
HeighOj Johnny ! 

The aglet and rowan, shine bright on the bough- 
Heigho ! Heigho ! 

But seedtime, or harvest be one to him now— 
Heigho, Johnny ! 

All one the wild weather, the wind and the rain- 
Heigho ! Heigho ! 

For she that made summer will not come again- 
Heigho, Johnny ! 

Was left in the lurch at a young woman's whim- 
Heigho ! Heigho ! 

Who cared not a cuss for the ruin of him — 
Heigho, Johnny ! 

Oh, little we mind what the seasons may bring— 
Heigho ! Heigho ! 

When hearts are a winter without any spring — 
Heigho, Johnny ! 



52 



THE GRAVE OF KEATS 



Where silver swathes of newly fallen hay 
Fling up their incense to the Roman sun ; 
Where violets spread their dusky leaves and run 
In a dim ripple, and a glittering bay 
Lifts overhead his living wreath ; where day 
Burns fierce upon his endless night and none 
Can whisper to him of the thing he won, 
Love-starved young Keats hath cast his gift of clay. 
And still the little marble makes a moan 
Under the scented shade ; one nightingale 
With many a meek and mourning monotone 
Throbs of his sorrow ; sings how oft men fail 
And leave their dearest light-bringers alone 
To shine unseen, and all unfriended pale. 



II 

Oh, leave the lyre upon his humble stone, 
The rest erase ; if Keats were come again, 
The quickest he to blot this cry of pain. 
The first to take a sorrowing world's atone. 
'Tis not the high magistral way to moan 
When a mean present leaps and sweeps amain 
Athwart the prophets' vision ; not one groan 
Escapes their souls, and lingers not one strain. 
They answer to their ideals ; their good 
Outshines all flare and glare of futile marts. 

53 



54 THE GRAVE OF KEATS 

They stand beside their altars while the flood 
Ephemeral rolls on and roars and parts. 
It shall not chill a poet's golden blood ; 
It cannot drown the masters' mighty hearts. 



TIGER 

To the barking of the monkeys, to the shrieking of the birds ; 
To the bellow of the bison and stampedijig of the herds ; 
At fiery edge of sunset, from the jungle to the wold. 
Death stalks in shining ebony and orange-tawny gold. 

He slouched with loose, low shamble from the glade, 

And as he flung his feet along the track, 

Machine-like glided each great shoulder-blade 

Under his pelt. He stopped and scratched his back 

Against a stump ; then sat a little while. 

Curling his ring-straked tail around his paws. 

Yawning with a gigantic, sleepy smile 

That showed the ruddy gulf between his jaws. 

The fangs were white and sound, for he was young — 

A male of four full years, in all his pride. 

Perfect, lean, knit of rubber and steel, and strung 

With sinews taut ; content and satisfied. 

Since the twice five great, crooked daggers set 

Deep in his awful pads had never failed 

To win his belly all it wanted yet — 

A tiger who unfailingly prevailed. 

And no beast kinglier than himself he knew, 

For he had tracked and hunted, caught and slain 

All that his fellow-tigers caught and slew. 

Though horns might miss by inches eye and brain. 

A forthright beast and huge, his yellow eyes 

Glowered steadfast into life ; he felt no ill 

Of heart or conscience, or the pang that flies 

Through higher mammals, plagued with choice of will 

55 



56 TIGER 

And all the handicaps of consciousness. 

He knew not right nor wrong; no evil thought 

Sullied his wits ; his task no more or less 

Than faithfully to do all he was taught. 

While the dread smeech and terror of his breath 

Down a hot wind at dusk, to fearful flocks 

Threatened the unknown, unnamed horror, death. 

And sent them hurtling to the plains and rocks. 

To him they stood for life and all it meant 

Of being — food and sport and work and play, 

Love and prosperity and full content, 

With strength to solve the problems of each day. 

His brain began to brood and meditate, 
Thinking on action, while the red sun set. 
For he had come from far with a new mate 
To a new valley. She was sleeping yet 
In the bamboos behind him, great with young, 
Where prickly cactus hemmed the lair and palm 
Over their couch its sombre frondage hung. 
There would she bide a little safe from harm, 
While he must go afield and do his part 
And fetch a tender antelope, or goat, 
To win her praise and glad her weary heart 
With a hot supper for a hungry throat. 
He pondered now within his broad, flat skull. 
Then stretched and with his lifted nose and ear 
Winnowed the silence of the evening lull 
To learn if grass-eaters were stirring near ; 
When down the wind, though not a lizard ran 
And no hoof thudded on the dusty bent. 
He smelt a something fragrant and began 
To twitch his nostrils at the ravishment. 



TIGER 57 

A subtle scent and new ! His whiskers pricked ; 
His body huddled fiat and seemed to shrink ; 
His great nape bristled up ; his jowl he licked : 
Then, like a banded snake, began to sink 
And trickle through the spear grass. By a stone 
He sudden lifted, then he set and stilled, 
While footfall of some game, that went alone, 
Came innocently pattering, to be killed. 
Couchant, like a set trap, with head out-thrust. 
The hunter crouched, quivering his black tail-tip. 
Until it drew a fan upon the dust 
Behind him. Then his jaws began to drip, 
As though a gargoyle, where red lichens grew, 
Was dribbling. Now the thing that he had heard 
Approached — a little creature, strange and new — 
That went not on four feet, nor yet a bird. 
He strung himself to spring, while at a trot, 
The Indian runner on his lonely road 
Jogged forward, dreaming of a supper-pot. 
Bound was he for a village, where abode 
One, passing fair, the runner's master meant 
To wed ere long — a radiant maid to whom, 
By fleet-foot messenger, the suitor sent 
Two poems of his own writing. 

Then the gloom, 
Where a first firefiy winked her golden spark 
Upon the deepening purple, broke and tore — 
The twilight stillness ended on a stark. 
Harsh, grating, deep-mouthed, solitary roar. 
Hollow as death ; while from his secret place 
The tiger loosed the lightning of his thighs, 
Leapt on the man and with unwitting grace 
Struck him to instant nothing. Levin files 



58 TIGER 

Less merciful. A huddled, crumpled clout, 

Brown, oozing red, dissolved beneath the mass 

Of living teeth and brawn. The brains were out ; 

Head, a cracked egg-shell leaking on the grass. 

Thus in a heap to mother earth they came. 

Both quick and dead ; and then the great cat sought 

His grim, familiar, ghastly after-game ; 

But he had hit too hard and spoiled his sport. 

He drew and coaxed with hooked and playful paws. 

Hoping to find the life had not quite gone, 

And moved by those infernal, feline laws. 

That made him frolic when his work was done. 

For oft his perishing food would feebly strive, 

Driven by life's undying hope, and led 

To struggle still from death while yet alive ; 

But his first man the tiger found was dead. 

And when the conqueror tasted, his rough tongue 

Thrilled a new, joyous lust into his brain, 

For the soft, furless stuff his palate stung 

With mad, delicious twang — oft, oft again 

Would he smell up the wind for such another. 

He hoped the dainty creatures went in packs, 

And that his prey had kids and many a brother 

To steal at cool of evening on his tracks. 

He gaped and gripped the mangled clod of earth 

Under its ribs, heaved up a muzzle white. 

Sounded a grunt, that seemed akin to mirth, 

And bore his dripping coolie out of sight. 

So to his mate, and as the cross-cut saws 

Bite upon teak with backward, forward hiss, 

He purred, then dropped the banquet from his jaws 

And woke the tigress with a bloody kiss. 



TIGER 59 

Eyes shut, heads sideway, cheek by cheek they ate, 

To sound of squash and gulch and cracking bone. 

Deciding swiftly, as they fed, the fate 

Of the two love songs. They were deftly sewn 

Within the compass of a gold-cloth bag. 

Tied with a silken cord, stamped with a seal. 

The tiger crunched and gulped the sodden rag 

With all the other mysteries of his meal. 

For, while a poem himself, he was no poet. 

Being devoid of vision, wit, or ruth ; 

But many who live poetry, never know it 

And would be much surprised to learn the truth. 

Sated at last, they sauntered forth to find 

A water-hole ; but as they washed their jowls 

And cleaned their whiskers, sudden on the wind 

Broke din of brass and drums and human howls. 

For there had gone another runner by. 

And smelt the blood and seen the reeking trail. 

And flown, and shouted " Bagh ! " and raised the cry 

That tiger were again upon the vale. 

From jungle edge they peered and torches red 

Turned each bewildered eye into a gem 

Of glinting emerald — then sudden dread 

Awoke at flash of fire, unknown to them. 

Fear touched their primitive hearts ; they ran and roared. 

Awakening old echoes down the glade ; 

Shoulder to shoulder from the gleam abhorred 

They padded, wondering to be afraid. 

Until no blink of the accursed thing 

Tortured the night, they galloped, sweating hot, 

Then, all unknowing what the day would bring, 

They stopped and sulked and snarled ; and so forgot. 



60 TIGER 

Anon they sleep, nor guess the dawn shall see, 

Of hunters white and beaters brown, some score 

Surround them in a circle steadfastly, 

To set the cosmos on its feet once more. 

They sleep, nor dream the pangs of "dum-dum" lead 

That wait on sunrise, when they two shall feel 

All they have measured to uncounted dead, 

And suffer sentences without appeal. 

Upon their mighty necks will dance the feet 

Of the unpelted things that lay them low ; 

For of the fruit forbidden did they eat 

x\nd both must go where the bad tigers go. 

To the trumpeting of elephants and blaze of morning light, 

To the nosing rifle barrels, to the stinking of cordite, 

With a crash and smash a7id struggle and a yell their tale is 

told; 
Death blots the shining ebony and orange-tawny gold. 



THE PUDDLE 

I CURSED the puddle when I found 

Unseeing I had walked therein, 

Forgetting the uneven ground, 

Because my eyes 

Were on the skies, 

To glean their glory and to win 

The sunset's trembling ecstasies. 

And then I marked the puddle's face, 

When still and quiet grown again. 

Was but concerned, as I, to trace 

The wonder spread 

Above its head, 

And mark and mirror and contain 

The gold and purple, rose and red. 



6i 



VISION 

There have been seers of olden time who said, 
When dreaming men are rapt into the state 
Where only shadow people congregate, 
That never may they see the faces of their dead. 

But I have seen the faces I have lost, 
And none so clear and none so shadowless 
In all that moonshine dance and frolic stress 
Of dream futility, as some I loved the most. 

Not as I knew him last my brother stood, 
A man upon whose kindly face a stain 
Lay in the letters of life's care and pain ; 
But as a little lad, when all the world was good. 

High in the darkness of a pine, elate 
About our long-forgotten forest play, 
I hung, where he had found a squirrel's dray : 
For I was twelve again, and he was only eight. 

I saw his boyhood's look, as bright and fair 

As ever shone from huddle of a dream ; 

Reality's own self shall never seem 

More real than his young laugh and flaxen, Saxon hair. 

And waking old, I blessed the memory 
Of my child-brother's unforgotten face, 
Thanking, as it had been a deed of grace, 
The tenderness of dreams that brought him back to me. 

62 



IN GALLIPOLI 

There is a told of lion-coloured earth, 
With stony feet in the ^gean blue, 
Whereon of old dwelt loneliness and dearth 
Sun-scorched and desolate ; and when there flew 
The winds of winter in those dreary aisles 
Of crag and cliff, a whirling snow-wreath bound 
The foreheads of the mountains, and their miles 
Of frowning precipice and scarp were wound 
With stilly white, that peered through brooding mist pro- 
found. 

But now the myrtle and the rosemary. 
The mastic and the rue, the scented thyme 
With fragrant fingers gladdening the grey. 
Shall kindle on a desert grown subUme. 
Henceforth that haggard land doth guard and hold 
The treasure of a sovereign nation's womb — 
Her fame, her worth, her pride, her purest gold. 
Oh, call ye not the sleeping place a tomb 
That lifts to heaven's light such everlasting bloom. 

They stretch, now high, now low, the little scars 

Upon the rugged pelt of herb and stone ; 

Above them sparkle bells and buds and stars 

Young Spring hath from her emerald kirtle thrown. 

Asphodel, crocus and anemone 

With silver, azure, crimson once again 

Ray all that earth, and from the murmuring sea 

Come winds to flash the leaves on shore and plain 

Where evermore our dead — our radiant dead shall reign. 

63 



64 IN GALLIPOLI 

Imperishable as the mountain height 

That marks their place afar, their numbers shine, 

Who with the first-fruits of a joyful might 

To human liberty another shrine 

Here sanctified ; nor vainly have they sped 

That made this desert dearer far than home, 

And left one sanctuary more to tread 

For England, whose memorial pathways roam 

Beside her hero sons, beneath the field and foam. 



THEN AND NOW 

When I was young and leapt into the Spring — 

An eager, quick-eyed, all-inquiring thing — 

I hunted wood and valley, sea and shore 

Yet knew not how to feel the wonders that I saw. 

Now am I old and creep into the Spring — 
A grey-haired, dim-eyed, still inquiring thing. 
By ancient ways, a shadow, still I steal, 
Yet know not how to see the wonders that I feel. 

Come Youth again, while to another Spring 

My memories the old adventure bring. 

Wonder and wander yet once more with me. 

I'll teach you how to feel, and you my eyes shall be. 



65 



VIGIL 

There is a glen beneath a lonely hill, 

Where the deep tangles of the red brake fern 

Huddle to death and beautifully burn, 

While maiden birches flame along the sunset still. 

Like morning lamps they fade ; their gold expires 
Among the silvery shadows of each stem. 
Delicious Hght gently departs from them 
Where winter bloweth out the autumn's final fires. 

Furzes, all agate-budded for the spring. 

Hedge round about the coomb and, higher still, 

A mist of naked branches hides the hill. 

And pines bring warmth and scent and dusky sheltering. 

How oft have I within this vernal wood 

Watched the green mantle and the sweet sap mount. 

Trees are mine own familiars ; them I count 

Among the changeless hearts that make my chiefest good. 

How often, when the first of blossoms come. 

Do I behold the opening of their eyes. 

Mine is the worship ; theirs the shy surprise 

That I so well should know each punctual haunt and home. 

Here have I watched full many a night from far 
Like lover shadowy, ere set of sun, 
Dark-eyed steal hither, and when day was done. 
Mist meet the gentle moon ; dew, the eternal star. 

66 



VIGIL 67 

Once more the stroke of every madcap wind 
Doth shake the bough and dash the ripe fruit down, 
Or shower red leaves and berries for a crown, 
October's stormy hair to glorify and bind. 

Again I see ; again I sigh to see 
The fading, flaming year sink to her end, 
Another summer — sure another friend — 
Dechne and die and pass with music solemnly. 

Farewell, ye happy, rainbow-winged hours ; 

The autumn's dew and bitter, silver breath 

Shall freeze your rosy feet, and strike to death 

Your spirits where ye drowse amid the withered flowers. 

Farewell ye domes and canopies of June 
Raining upon the earth in red and gold ; 
Hiding the sodden bosom of the wold ; 
Flying like little ghosts, beneath the hunter's moon. 

Beside the passing year my watch I keep 

And mark the sad-eyed gloamings steal away, 

And feel the low and lemon light of day 

Fade, like an aching care, upon the fringe of sleep. 



DARTMOOR NIGHT 

Now twilight spreads her cool and amber plume, 
Descending on the solitudes until 
All detail dies : the valley and the hill 
Together darkling roll and merge into the gloom. 

Faints the far emerald west and day is done ; 

White Venus, throbbing on the dusky gold. 

Swings out her lamp above the weald and wold. 

While little, earth-born flames make answer one by one. 

A child upon her mighty mother's breast, 

Earth cuddles in the bosom of old Night, 

Who, gathering coomb and woodland, heath and height. 

Opens her dewy wings to hide their dreamless rest. 

The mists are trailing grey by watersmeet, 

Night-hidden in the forest far below, 

And where their pearly-paven vapours flow, 

The Huntress upward steals to find her starry seat. 

Her waxing splendours over moss and mire 
Flood fen and barrow, reeve and pool and burn. 
The lone, high tors, the tracks that wind and turn 
Where the quartz crystal shines with dim and tremulous 
fire. 

She marks the stone-man's lodges empty lie ; 
The broken folds, the tinner's delving place ; 
She lights the cairn, the cross, the faltering trace 
Of bygone dead who homed in this immensity. 

68 



DARTMOOR NIGHT 69 

From cottage window fades the ruby gem 

And glimmer moonbeams only ; while the moon, 

Mounting to heaven upon her silver shoon, 

A sovereign sceptre holds and wears the diadem, 

O Queen of sleep and silence, ihou shalt reign, 
With lustral glory poured to soothe and bless 
The least small life in all the wilderness, 
Till morning stars awake and sing the dawn again. 



THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 

The seraphim, beneath their burning blades, 

Moved in a wave of light ; while overhead 

Gleamed the pale moon, a ghost behind the tongues 

Of all those flaming swords ; and rearward crept 

The brutes of Paradise — the tiger, ounce. 

The leopard and the minions of the night. 

Stealthy they stalked, with growls that showed the fang. 

While in a broken thread of fiery beads. 

Golden and green and ruby, through the dark. 

Fierce glowed their eyes behind that angel host. 

And now they roared for mingled grief and fear, 

Because, before the moving seraphim. 

Flung out for ever from the dingles deep 

And all those pleasant places of sweet shade 

Beside the rivers and beneath the trees, 

Two, whom the great cats loved, were driven forth. 

Bewildered and disgraced, the primal pair. 

Now glimmering with moonlight on their heads 

And streaks of flickered gold that splashed along 

Their thighs and backs, reflected from the swords. 

Together went. Hand clasped in hand they moved 

Before the marching angels, till at last 

The confines of the only home they knew 

Were reached and the soft herbage made an end. 

Over their heads the tracery of trees 

Ceased, and the naked moon among her stars 

Hung in the nightly sky and threw a ligh|:, 

Cold as grey ashes, on the earth beneath. 

Starkly the desert struck upon their toes 

70 



THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 71 

With harsh and flinty welcome ; Eve's right foot, 

Set down upon a thistle, cried to her 

Of a new grief; she moaned in pain, and he, 

Adam, with tenderness bent down to it 

And licked the blood that sparkled on her skin 

In drops the moonlight robbed of sanguine stain 

And turned to bright, black pearls. Thus driven forth 

Were they for their transgression, and the guard 

Took open order on the fringe of Eden, 

Against whose frontier dark the sentinels 

Stood silently, lit by their burning swords. 

To hold the garden precincts ; while between 

Each seraph and his neighbour still peeped out 

The creatures of the earth and howled farewell 

To those white things that had befriended them. 

And taught their cubs to play in Paradise. 

They crouched and lashed their tails and shook the night 

That Eve and Adam to the wilderness 

Should pass away without one lynx or pard 

To purr beside them. All would have rushed forth 

But that the ring of fire struck on their hearts 

And sent them snarling back. For there had been 

A precious bond, a close and curious link 

Twixt Adam and his partner and the brutes — 

A harmony of happiness and peace 

Now vanished from the earth. But then, indeed, 

The first man and his woman stood so near 

To all their neighbours, sharing their delights 

And moving in that new-made world so nigh 

To beast and bird and saurian, that they — 

The conscious creatures —knowing little more 

Than woodland wisdom shared with all the rest. 

Guessed not the gap between. Had ape or sloth 



72 THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 

Broke heavenly ordinance and ate the Fruit, 

Then had they been the lords of good and ill, 

And haply ruled the kingdoms of the earth 

With kinder wit than man. Yet it fell out 

The creatures in the image of their God 

Won the beasts' homage by their shapes upright, 

Yet shared their subjects' ignorance. The stag, 

The tawny bear, the elephant, the wolf, 

The monkey folk and all the greater fowls. 

Composed their theme and filled their human minds 

With fascination. And betwixt themselves, 

When Adam spoke to Eve or she to him, 

Their converse was abrupt and cynical, 

Untinged by human ruth, or tender care 

Each for the other's inner happiness. 

And when the shadows lengthened and their God 

Walked for awhile between them through the cool 

Of dewy evenings, in their simple way. 

They chattered to Him of the names they gave 

Unto the great gier-eagle on the crag. 

Or hippo, with his mighty nose asnort 

Above the mud of Paradise. And He 

Would listen with celestial gravity 

And go His way again. The couple lacked 

Much food for thought ; indeed, they never thought ; 

For what had they to think about beside 

The living present and the daily joy 

Of food and drink and sleep, and playtime shared 

With lesser things as beautiful as they? 

Thus did they live through days not fuller fraught 

With care and vision of to-morrow's dawn 

Than their companions of the hoof and pad 

And claw and shining wing. Their mingled life 



THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 73 

Was neither more complete nor beautiful 

Than that of the striped tiger and his mate, 

Who dwelt together in a porphyry den 

A stone's throw from the holt that Adam wove 

Of living boughs and green wood broken down 

Wherein to sleep by Eve. The very birds — 

The warbler and the chaffinch and the wren, 

Or the red mouse that loved the seeding grass — 

Built snugger homes than they ; and they w^ould laugh 

And wonder how the little, busy things, 

Having no hands, could weave so close and true ; 

Or how the spider lined her nest with silk 

To hold her pearly eggs. And when they slept 

They dreamed of good to-morrows and no more. 

Such as the children dream. 

Then came to them 
The scorching breath of knowledge, and their jest : 
To make God laugh when He should come and see 
Them clad with leaves and flowers, as their friends 
Were clothed with pelt and feathers — their poor jest, 
When they perceived them naked, brought them down 
And cast them out into another world 
Beyond the joys of Eden. 

That first night 
Their incipient spirits wept some mournful while, 
Till the moon sank upon a dreary rim 
Of desolation and they watched the stars 
Sink to earth's edge and vanish one by one. 
Like tears that stole adown night's cheek ; and then 
They turned to look again where Paradise 
Lay in a purple shadow on the east 



74 THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 

Under her palms and mountains ; while along 

Those far-flung boundaries dim sparks of fire 

Twinkled to mark the soldier angels stand. 

Adam at last, in hollow of a dune, 

Whose horrent hair along its crest sprang up 

In withered bents, a place of shelter found 

Where the night wind came not ; and there the man 

His limping partner brought, then laid her down 

To sleep till day ; but it was keen and chill 

And, finding that Eve slumbered, Adam came 

As close as he well might to warm his blood 

And draw a little of her golden mane 

About his frozen bosom. 



Thus they slept, 
Until there broke on earth another day. 
Whose light unwitting touched a wondrous sight 
More pregnant and more precious to the world 
Than Earth until that dayspring hour had known. 
For when young Eve awakened, from her eyes 
Flashed a new glory, something that till now 
Had never trembled in those azure deeps ; 
And, wuth her arms about her dreaming man. 
She called to him, and he arose to see 
A change in her fair face, the which he read 
In light of his own quickening. Her voice 
Proclaimed a new evangel from her heart, 
And full upon the thin and desert air 
Poured in the ear of Adam such sweet words 
That he forgot his hunger and his grief 
And looked at her, the dew in her bright hair. 
As subject on a queen. 



THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 75 

" My love ! " she cried ; 
And since the word had never till that dawn 
Set the air singing, he forgot all else 
And listened open-mouthed. " My own true love, 
Dost thou not feel within thy bosom's home 
A strange new spirit, born for me and thee ? 
Dost thou not pant with such a joy that never. 
Until this daybreak on the wilderness, 
Thy soul hath throbbed to feel ? In that sharp grief. 
While the white seraphim did drive us out, 
I felt the first faint thrill that fought the grief. 
And when you bent and licked my wounded foot. 
Even then there flashed to me a sudden bliss 
That ministered the pain !" 

''And I," said he, 
" If I had felt as now I feel — on fire 
With tender adoration for my Eve — 
Oh, then, I never should have played the coward 
And flung the blame on you, my better part. 
But taken it myself. This light within. 
That burns far brighter than the eastern sky. 
Doth show how mean and vile and base a thing 
I did to bleat that thou hadst tempted me; 
For now I grow to something greater far. 
More wise and more discerning than before 
I ate the Fruit of the Tree. O would that I 
Had claimed the punishment, as meet I should, 
And been cast out and suffered happily 
Knowing that thou wert safe in Paradise ; 
For then had I but laughed at thorns and flint 
And the cold night beneath the setting stars. 
Knowing my Eve safe in our httle lair." 



76 THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 

" Man, man ! " she answered, "what our lair to me, 

And what all Eden and the golden sun. 

Without my Adam ? What the crystal founts 

And aubade of the birds in misty denes ? 

And what the morning mellowness of fruits, 

Or subtle, magic fragrance born by night 

From moony blossoms, that obeyed the moon 

And oped, all others shutting? Eden's self 

Had been this ugly desert spread for Eve 

Without thee ; but beside thee, close and close, 

Near as thy shadow, then these antres vast 

And dreary vague of lion-coloured dust 

Is paradise enough. For we have won 

From that thrice-blessed Fruit a dearer thing 

Than all the blossomy paths of Paradise 

Knew how to offer. Through the taste of it 

We are become above the cherubim. 

Who never feel, beneath the rainbow light 

That dreams upon their bosoms, what a man 

And woman feel when love unveils their eyes." 

" We must tell God," said Adam. " When He knows 

What hides within the amethystine rind 

Of that sweet globe forbidden, then will He 

Make haste to eat of it Himself, and so, 

Touched by ineffable and sacred love. 

Seek us, all naked in the desert sand, 

With pity on His awful brow. And then 

Us will He soon forgive, for if He eats, 

A tender, lambent flame of gentle ruth 

Must burn within His everlasting Heart 

And crown Him with pure mercy." Thus the man ; 

And then the woman's voice throbbed cheerfully. 

" Him will we tell how this that He denied 



THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 77 

Has lifted us above all lesser life 

And made us wiser than the seraphim, 

Who drove me forth so roughly that they scorched 

My shoulder with their swords. But this I know : 

If Michael and his winged ones had ate 

From that kind fruit, as you and I did eat, 

A gentle pity would have taught them sheathe 

Their brands and made them weep to do us harm. 

For what to them were we but beings twain. 

No better than the silly, little apes 

That would not come to us from out the wood 

Until I tempted them with sugary fruits 

And almonds that they loved ? But now, but now 

Are we above all creatures lifted up 

And wedded into one — aye, wedded so 

That life for me is Adam, and for him 

Nothing but Eve. Let that our Maker hear. 

And when He learns what now thou art to me 

And I to thee, and what this lifeless dust 

And shadeless solitude do seem to be 

With thy brown hand in mine, then will He know 

That we, His creatures, now have haply found 

A dearer and more precious Paradise 

Than all the hosts of Heaven yet thought upon. 

Him we must tell, and from our wondrous cup 

He too shall drink, that He, our God, may know 

The blessed taste of mercy." 

" I will bid 
The seraphim to pray to Him for mates ! " 
Cried Adam, in a fervour that all Heaven 
Should share the knowledge dazzling. "Yea, let Him 
Cast down his hosts in slumber and withdraw 



78 THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 

A woman angel from each winged side, 

So that they cast away their writhing swords 

Far from them and rejoice, as we rejoice, 

To share a life with dearer life than theirs." 

They spurred each other on, and laughed to think 

Of the divine delight when God should hear 

Their wondrous rede ; and then together turned 

Where Paradise, like a low silver cloud. 

Fretted the dawn. But now to them there flew 

Out of the waxing sky a messenger, 

Who bade them keep their faces to the void 

And nevermore approach the sinless paths 

Their innocent feet had trod before they fell. 

" Wisdom hath spoken, and it is decreed " — 

With unimpassioned voice the angel spoke — 

" That now ye thieves of wisdom through your span 

Shall suffer first and bear the eternal fruit 

Of your unnatural sin. And when the years 

Have worn and withered you and broke you down, 

Since Time hath now dominion over you. 

Then shall you die and turn again to dust 

From which the Almighty, in too generous mood, 

Did lift you up. Begone — your way lies there ! 

And know that since the parents' sin must be 

On children visited for evermore. 

Ye shall have seed and bring the race of man 

Upon this earth to taste the bitter drink 

That ye have brewed for every human lip." 

" But we have much to tell our God ! " cried Eve ; 

While he, the servant of Omnipotence, 

With level tones indifferent, broke to them 

That never more their Maker should t.^ey see. 

Thereon he spread his wings, and in the light 



THE FRUIT OF THE TREE 79 

Of the red morning opened, petal-wise, 

His gorgeous pinions, like a new-born flower 

All opal tinted. So he flew away, 

And soon was lost to sight upon the clouds 

That day had fringed with fire. 

A little while 
The pair stood very silent ; then young Eve, 
Mother of all men, from her wide blue eyes 
Shaking the tear, that like a diamond hung 
One moment on her lashes, smiled and set 
Her arms about our primal father's neck. 
" Be of good cheer ; we have each other still. 
My own brave heart ! " said she ; "and what this death 
Shall prove, concerning which the angel spake. 
We know not and we fear not ; for 'tis sure 
That death can never be so strong, or good, 
Or radiant and enduring and supreme 
As love, that we have won to light our way 
And guide us through all deserts and all griefs. 
And since He will not let us speak to Him, 
Or tell Him of our treasure, it shall flow 
For babes and sucklings. With their mother's milk 
I'll teach my little children how to love." 



WHERE MY TREASURE IS 

Eternal Mother, when my race is run, 
Will that I pass beneath the risen sun, 
Suffer my sight to dim upon some spot 
That changes not. 

Let my last pillow be the land I love 
With fair infinity of blue above ; 
The roaming shadow of a silver cloud. 
My only shroud. 

A little lark above the morning star, 
Shall shrill the tidings of my end afar ; 
The muffled musfc of a lone sheep-bell 
Shall be my knell. 

And where stone heroes trod the Moor of old ; 
Where ancient wolf howled round a granite fold ; 
Hide thou, beneath the heather's new-born light, 
My endless night. 



80 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: April 2009 



